Those who look on others from the standpoint of self-righteousness, see always something to criticize; those who look kindly, see ever something to approve. Having righteousness for their standard, it is possible for them to discern in others everything which may be measured by that standard. Self-righteousness finally brings sourness and lonesomeness, but kindness is in itself warmth and comfort.
Mortal mind is largely a compound of faults that have been found. It occupies itself in finding fault. The thief or the murderer justifies his own evil conduct by criticism of the victim. The dishonest person, who takes the services of the professional man or the goods of the merchant without intending to pay, is the meanest critic of those of whom he has taken advantage. Indeed, when some one is loudly railing against a fellow citizen, we may often guess that he owes that fellow citizen either money or gratitude. The apostolic advice, "Owe no man anything, but to love one another," if understood by such persons, would have healing efficacy. Among the practical results of the healing of sickness may be found the consequent conduct in the line of decency, honesty, and humility.
The deliverance of a man from prison life and forced labor is only a type of that other deliverance from the jailer pride and the hard labor of faultfinding. Think of the servitude of those who feel that they are under the necessity of criticizing others without having any standard; who feel that they must therefore depreciate and diminish and humiliate every one. The children of the market-place to whom Jesus referred, represent this type; they are never to be pleased. "We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced," they say; "we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented." Let us play at a wedding, say some of the children; but the critic will not joy with them. Then, let us play funeral, they say; but the critic will not join in the lamenting. Nothing will or can please him. John came as an ascetic; they said of him, "He hath a devil." Jesus was no ascetic, but mingled naturally with his fellow men; they charged him with gluttony and wine-bibbing. The critic always expresses his superiority by seeing and declaring faults in others, even if these faults never existed, and so veils from himself his actual inferiority and his many faults that, like hidden sores, are bandaged by vanity but not healed by love.
